Introduction

A
foreign language is not just a

subject
learnt in the classroom…

it
is something which is used for

communication
by real people

in
real situations.

We
live in Belarus and our native language is Belarusian. Almost all the
words are native in our language. But some of them are borrowed from
other languages, though they got their meanings, spelling, according
to the Belarusian language. I have been learning English since the
first form, so English is the third language in which I can
communicate a little. Since the sixth form I began to study German,
comparing pronunciations of the words, grammar rules, spelling it
became easier for me to learn these languages. And I am sure that it
is easier to learn several languages comparing them.

Last
year I took part in the research work and I got a deeper knowledge of
borrowings in English language. And this year I decided to deepen my
knowledge in this theme too. So today we would like to present you
more information about borrowings in English language. This theme
sounds interesting for us and we guess you will be interested in it
too.

An
international vocabulary in any language changes due to the
development of economy, science, education etc. Everything depends on
time. The same is in English.

The
purpose
of our research work is to study French borrowings in the modern
English language.

The
purpose has defined the following tasks:

try
to highlight the oldest words borrowed from French;

compare
unique domination of widespread languages in a certain epoch;

show
that English is now the most widespread of the word's languages;

discern
the influence of the French language in the early modern period;

compare
the sound of "Norman English" of the middle ages and the
modern variant.

French borrowings in the modern english language

English
is a Germanic
Language of the Indo-European Family. It is the second
most spoken language in the world.

It
is estimated that there are 300 million native speakers and 300
million who use English as a second language and a further 100
million use it as a foreign language. It is the language of science,
aviation, computing, diplomacy, and tourism. It is listed as the
official or co-official language of over 45 countries and is spoken
extensively in other countries where it has no official status.

This
domination is unique in history. English is on its way to becoming
the world's unofficial international language. Mandarin (Chinese) is
spoken by more people, but English is now the most widespread of the
world's languages.

Half
of all business deals are conducted in English. Two thirds of all
scientific papers are written in English. Over 70% of all post / mail
is written and addressed in English. Most international tourism,
aviation and diplomacy are conducted in English.

English
contains many words from Norman French, brought to England during the
11th century Norman Conquest.

In
1066 the Normans conquered Britain. French
became the language of the Norman aristocracy and added more
vocabulary to English. More pairs of similar words arose.

Table
1. French-English bilinguism

French

English

close

shut

reply

answer

odour

smell

annual

yearly

demand

ask

chamber

room

desire

wish

power

might

ire

wrath
/ anger

Because
the English underclass cooked for the Norman upper class, the words
for most domestic animals are English (ox, cow, calf, sheep, swine, deer)
while the words for the meats derived from them are French (beef,
veal, mutton, pork, bacon, venison).

The
Germanic form of plurals (house, housen; shoe, shoen)
was eventually displaced by the French method of making plurals:
adding an s
(house, houses; shoe, shoes).
Only a few words have retained their Germanic plurals: men, oxen, feet, teeth, children.

It
wasn't till the 14th Century that English became dominant in Britain
again. In 1399, King Henry IV became the first king of England since
the Norman Conquest whose mother tongue was English. By the end of
the 14th Century, the dialect of London had emerged as the standard
dialect of what we now call Middle English.
Chaucer wrote in this language.

Modern English
began around the 16th Century and, like all languages, is still
changing. One change occurred when the suffix of some verb forms
became s (loveth, loves; hath, has).
Auxiliary verbs also changed (he is risen, he has risen).

Norman French
is the 11th century language of France
and England.
It is an Indo-European
language.

In
1066, the Norman
king, William the Conqueror,
invaded England.
Many Norman French
words entered the language after this. In general, the Normans
were the nobility, while the native English
were their servants. The names of domestic animals and their meats
show this relationship. The animal name is English
("cow", "sheep", "pig") while
the names of the meats derived from these animals is French
("beef", "mutton", "pork").

Table
2. English - A Historical Summary

Many
words have been borrowed from Norman French.
These can be grouped into several types:

legal
terms ("adultery", "slander"),

military
words ("surrender", "occupy"),

names
of meats ("bacon", "venison"),

words
from the royal court ("chivalry", "majesty").

the
non-metric unit of volume (the "gallon") is Norman French.
There are many other words.

Gower
writes mostly in French (but composes one long work Confessio amantis,
in English)

·
Chaucer writes almost entirely in English.

·
Evidence of private letters:

·
1350: French is the rule.

·
After 1400: English becomes common.

·
After 1450: English is the rule.

·
Use of English in schools.

The
influence of French on English in the early modern period

Influence
on English phrasing

Aside
from borrowing and word formation, French considerably influenced
English phrasing. The loan translations range from polite turns of
speech, such as at your service, do me the favour, to engage somebody in a quarrel, to make (later:
pay)
a visit, to
idiomatic phrases like by occasion, in detail, in favour of, in the last resort, in particular, to the contrary.

ME
pronounciation

The
English language of the middle ages is different from the modern one.
Here are two extracts from Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales to
compare:

From
the General Prologue Whan
that April with his showres soote The droughte of March hath perced
to the roote, And bathed every veine in swich licour, Of which vertu
engendred is the flowr;

Whan
Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth Inspired hath in every holt and
heeth The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne Hath in the Ram his
halve cours yronne, And smale fowles maken melodye That sleepen al
the night with open yë - (So priketh hem Nature in hir corages)
- Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, And palmeres for to
seken straunge strondes To ferne halwes, couthe in sondry londes;

And
specially from every shires ende Of Engelond to Canterbury they
wende, The holy blisful martyr for to seeke, That hem hath holpen
whan that they were seke.

Conclusion

Language
belongs to each of us. Everyone uses words. What is there in a
language that makes people so curious? The answer is that there is
almost nothing in our life that is not touched by language. We all
speak and we all listen so we are all interested in the origin of
words, in how they appear and die. Nowadays 750 million people all
over the world use English. It has become the language of the planet.

Most
of words are the same, but there are some differences. For example in
Middle English ynogh
is enough in
modern English; longe
is long;
agoon
is ago
and so on, but they are a little bit similar in writing, so it is not
very difficult to understand them.

Though
the number of French loans in the modern period is relatively minor
in comparison to Middle English, the contribution is most important.
The French Loans were primarily borrowed to provide richness to the
language. Whilst it was arguable during the Restoration whether the
loans were corrupting or enriching the language, today there is no
doubt or disputable grounds to argue that the loans did nothing but
enrich the English language.

The
borrowing of vocabulary is rapprochement of nations on the ground of
economic, political and cultural connections. The bright example of
it can be numerous French borrowings to English language.

Attempts
to continue borrowings in 20th
century did not have special success because language became more
independent.

In
my opinion we managed to study the problems of French borrowings in
the English language. We understood possible ways of penetrating
French words in the English language, we have seen difference ways of
difference types of borrowings.

In
spite of arrival of the words from different languages into the
English vocabulary, the English Language did not suffer from large
flow of foreign elements.

On
the contrary its vocabulary has been enriched due to the taken
foreign elements.